What if Keir Starmer had been forced to move school part way through?

[Kitsot]

I find it interesting that Keir Starmer attended a state grammar school and was allowed to stay on for free after it moved to private whilst he was there. He doesn’t seem to consider it an issue that children will need to be moved from private to state school part way through their time at a school due to the VAT imposition. I wonder how different his life would have turned out if he had instead been forced to leave his school and move to the local comprehensive or wherever had space.

Further to this, to me it would make more sense if VAT was only added to fees for children joining at the usual entry points from next September and then going forward for those years from that point. It would still be an unpopular policy but it would at least give parents time to apply for state schools within the normal entry rounds and children wouldn’t need to move school part way through, which can be hard even if it is between two similar types of schools. The downside is that it wouldn’t initially raise as much money as planned.

Just for transparency to add that I am in a fairly neutral position regarding this and have experience of both sectors. I myself am from a working-class background and went to a bog-standard comprehensive in the 1980s.

It's a very popular policy in my circles, I'm very happy it's finally happening.

And Finnish kids seem.to.be doing very well without private school....get rid of the lot and equalise education (and hopefully society)

I didn't say it was, or that I agree that VAT on private schools is the best way to raise funding for education.

But charitable status does allow schools to avoid costs, even if you only include the 80% relief on business rates.

https://www.pepf.co.uk/publications/local-taxation-relief-and-charitable-private-schools-a-study/

Hopefully it's not your job to educate anybody.

https://www.pepf.co.uk/publications/local-taxation-relief-and-charitable-private-schools-a-study/

It was in the 2019 Labour Manifesto, so the idea has been out there for a good few years years. I'd have thought that people thinking of investing in private education would have at least been aware. Perhaps they thought that Labour would drop it, or that the Tories would win another election. Fair enough, we all have different appetites to risk.

And yes, if I were going to invest tens of thousands of pounds in something, I would do my research first. Again, different attitudes to risk, I suppose.

My children moved schools 8 times throughout their time...they thrived.

Pretty standard for most military families.

Get a grip!

The decisions Kier Starmas parents made about his education growing up have no baring over decisions he makes in the government now. That's like you being blamed for a decision your parents made when you where a child that you had no control over.

@CheshireCat1 "What about the children that pass their 11+ but can’t go to grammar school because their parents can’t afford the uniform"

I am opposed to selective education. But I would be surprised if this is still an issue.

I think you’re viewing this from now tbh. And if what you are saying was the case ‘sensible parents’ were avoiding private due to a 20% tax hike in 2025 in 2019 we would have seen advice on here on various private threads then

Did you post advice in 2019 about this likely rise?

It's amazing the ways people can find to rehash this issue! 🤣

Then they can't afford the uniform for a non- selective school either. So they contact the school which probably has a hardship fund or can provide second hand.

On that we can agree! I pay people to do that for me.

What’s the relevance of the link you posted?

One of these private businesses charities pays 32 staff over 150,000 a year...

This is a more general issue. For example, Nuffield Health is a charity. Steven Grey (COO) earned £1.2M last year.

Of course I didn't, it isn't my job to advise others on how to spend their money. And if I'd have been advising them at all, I'd have advised them not to bother as I consider private school fees to be a monumental waste of money for most people. But how others choose to invest their spare cash is their call.

What I'm saying is that I was aware that it was Labour Party policy because it was in their 2019 manifesto, so it was clearly in the public domain. If I was going to make a significant financial commitment over a period of several years, I would do some research. Of course, those for whom private school fees are just small change probably wouldn't feel the need to do any research prior to investing, but those people are presumably able to pay the VAT on any case.

I just don't understand why, if continuity of schooling is deemed important, parents wouldn't have built in bigger financial buffers to protect their kids.

No one did. If you had you would have been alone. I’m glad though even with the strength of foresight it didn’t quite make it to a post.

It really wasn’t being discussed by anyone, if you had posted I would have revised my opinion but since no one did then I think the ‘sensible parent’ thing is just a pat on own back far after the time.

Perhaps you could pay somebody to read it for you?

The problem with that argument as I see it is that very many things were in the Tory manifesto in 2019, many of which they didn't do, and other things not in the manifesto they did do. I think it is unreasonable to expect a government with no plan to do what it said it would.

eg Donating 700million to Rwanda wasn't in the manifesto.

No of course. I'm just saying that, if I were going to invest that much in anything over an extended period for something that was very important to me, I would be doing quite a lot of scenario planning and building in a large financial buffer to cover all eventualities.

Maybe I'm just more risk averse than most.

That would seem wasteful 😂

I just assumed you were wanting to contribute to the discussion, and it wasn’t clear to me why you kept posting the same link.

@MrsBennetsPoorNerves I do agree, and am fortunate that this is what we did.

However there are a lot of parents who now have kids in exam years, who did plan, but were not quite that risk averse. So they planned for some increase and a buffer, but not quite enough. In that period of time they had to cope with increases from covid, staff pay increases, supply cost increases, RAAC remediation, and now VAT (and a host of other things).

In some schools fees will have more than doubled within 5 years.

There will be parents who entered private as such. There will be some who didn’t. I don’t think anyone was talking about Labour manifesto much in 2019 despite pp claims.

If it were common for parents it would have surfaced here back then.

You raise some valid points. I accept that people have different appetites for risk and therefore make different provisions, and I recognise that there have been a lot of unforeseen circumstances in the last few years.

But if some school fees have more than doubled within the last 5 years, which is way more than the rate of inflation, then perhaps the schools need to start absorbing some of these costs to help these families.

I also think parents have different situations. An NT dc in good state going to good university can be a decent route. We’ve just done it and feel fine about not spending on fees. I’ll add here I know we were lucky with state choice and know area has an impact.

But I can see for others that they have other factors and stresses and I really feel for the dc caught up in this. I hope it does raise the funding people expect at least to counter some of it.

I also really question the it was in the 2019 manifesto point. That was silence from everyone and sensible people (which I think is looking back tbh) were not even raising it.

The Labour manifesto VAT on p/s fees was covered in 2019 in the Telegraph, Independent etc and on Mumsnet.